


Secret Injury

by TetrodotoxinB



Series: Whumptober 2019 [24]
Category: MacGyver (TV 2016)
Genre: Bleeding, Canon-Typical Violence, Day 23, Improvised Medical Care, Prompt: Secret injury, Whumptober 2019, field medicine, gunshot wound
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-24
Updated: 2019-10-24
Packaged: 2021-01-02 09:06:47
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,418
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21159107
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TetrodotoxinB/pseuds/TetrodotoxinB
Summary: Good teamwork is based on good communication... something Mac and Jack have yet to learn.





	Secret Injury

**Author's Note:**

> Beta'd by [Secret_Library98](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Secret_Library98/pseuds/Secret_Library98).

The sounds of fighting filter down the ramp into underground parking deck. Jack’s up there and part of Mac wants to help — it’s four against one as far as Mac can see — but Mac also knows that this is the delegation of responsibilities. Mac defuses the bomb, Jack gives Mac the chance to defuse the bomb. No one said they had to like it.

With the flat chisel on his knife, Mac begins prying the bomb housing off the cement support pilar. The device is blessedly simple. There’s one redundant circuit in the whole mess and it’s easily bypassed. Mac has the thing defused and rendered inert in just over two minutes, which coincidentally is also how long it takes Jack to finish up with the guys on the level above Mac.

Jack comes to a stop beside Mac as he’s gathering up the components that he thinks they might be able to use later. 

“You, uh,” Jack takes a deep breath and waves at the bomb remnants.

“Yeah, we’re good. You alright? Sounded like you had a lot of company up there,” Mac comments as they head towards the stairwell at the back of the garage.

Jack’s breathing hard, harder than he usually does, but then fighting four or more guys at once probably was a bit more of an exertion than their usual calisthenics. 

“Nah, it was only five guys and they weren’t even that tough. Punched one guy so hard he wet himself,” Jack happily informs him.

Mac snorts and holds the door to the stairwell open for Jack. They hustle up the stairs — exfil will meet them on the roof — but after two flights Jack starts to flag.

“Don’t tell me you’re already getting tired,” Mac jokes. 

Jack laughs and shakes his head, but in the dim backup lights of the stairwell, Mac sees the exhaustion and strain on Jack’s face. “I’m not that old.” 

And no, in the grand scheme of it all, Jack isn’t that old. But he’s not that young either, and there’s no way he got out of that fight without taking a few hits. 

Mac slows down enough so that he doesn’t leave Jack, but between the second and fourth flights, Jack loses most of his “people are trying to shoot us” momentum. He’s leaning against the wall of the stairwell for support, his hand pressed against his ribs and his breath coming fast and shallow. 

Mac dumps everything he’s carrying but the bomb components that he absolutely can’t leave and stuffs the rest in his pockets, slipping his arm under Jack’s and bodily hauling him up the stairs. “Jack, how badly are you injured?” 

“Eh, on a scale of papercut to sucked into a woodchipper I’m at like a three-point-five,” Jack answers, his breath coming in shallow pants.

Mac feels a wet warmth on his side where Jack’s pressed up against him. It doesn’t take Mac’s substantial intellect to deduce the source. “And on a scale of papercut to hemophilia how close are you to passing out from blood loss?”

“Seven, maybe eight,” Jack admits sheepishly.

Mac reaches up to his ear and taps his comm. “Matty, we’re going to need medical. Jack’s injured.”

“Well, you can get all the medical you want if you can make it to exfil,” Matty says. “They’d come help but apparently you haven’t made any friends on your mission and exfil is trying to keep them busy so you can hobble your way up the stairs. By the way, how’s that coming?”

Mac hefts Jack again, dragging him around another corner. “Not great. Jack’s bleeding heavily.”

“Um, why?” Matty asks with no small amount of incredulity.

They round the landing of the fifth floor and Mac looks at Jack out of the corner of his eye. “Hey, Jack. Matty wants to know why you’re bleeding.”

“I know she wants to know. I still have my earwig,” Jack grumbles. “Some jackass with a shiny knife stabbed me.”

“Oh, is that all?” Matty chastises. “Just a small leak in your torso. No big deal. Dalton, what the hell is wrong with you?”

The toe of Jack’s tac boot catches a stair and he trips, taking Mac down too. It’s a rather ungraceful landing and Mac manages to bang both elbows on the riser in front of him, shooting tingling pain and numbness down both arms.

“Right now what’s wrong with him is blood loss,” Mac says, trying to avert the ass-reaming for a later date that will hopefully involve fewer guns.

Jack tries to regain his feet but staggers and ultimately loses his balance again. Mac, unable to do anything else on stairs, grabs Jack under the arms and drags him up to the next landing. Jack’s still sort of conscious and he tries to bat at Mac’s hands when he tries to undo the velcro tabs on his flack jacket.

“I dressed it,” Jack mumbles.

Mac raises his eyebrows and pulls the tac vest open. Jack’s version of 'dressing it' is apparently wadding up a tshirt, pressing it against the stab wound, and pulling his velcro tabs really tight to keep pressure on it. The effect of this particular attempt has been less than spectacular.

“Matty, we’re on level six. How many more flights are there?” Mac asks, tearing the blood soaked fabric into smaller strips.

“Exfil is on the roof, level eight,” she informs him. “How’s it coming?”

“Jack’s down. I’m going to try to dress the wound before I drag him the rest of the way up. If someone from exfil could give me a hand that’d be great,” Mac says. “Jack, this is going to hurt.”

Jack’s eyes track to Mac but they’re unfocused and hazy. He lifts a hand and then drops it.

“I know, Jack. Just hang tight,” Mac says. 

It’s not a high-tech solution and it’s hardly going to solve the problem. At most, this will buy Jack a few minutes, long enough to get to the helo and get some fluids on board. Quickly, before he can overthink this, Mac uses his finger to stuff two of the longer strips of cloth into the wound. 

Jack screams and slaps weakly at Mac. It’s easily deflected in Jack’s current state, and his screams seem to wear him out even further, but Mac works until the wound is packed and the blood flow has nearly stopped. 

“Alright, come on. Up we go,” Mac says.

Exfil still has their hands full, so Mac moves back behind Jack’s head, and slips his now bloody hands under Jack’s arms. The moment Mac elevates Jack’s head, he passes out. It’s definitely not the recommended position for someone with low blood pressure, but Mac can’t exactly drag Jack up the stairs backwards, knocking his head against every step on the way up, and trying fireman’s carry up a flight of stairs is just asking to fall. 

By the time they reach the top, Mac’s back is killing him, but exfil has set up cover for Mac to make it to the helo with Jack. He drags Jack’s limp body over, and the corpsman helps haul Jack aboard and then gets to work.

They’re halfway to the hospital when Jack regains consciousness, though he’s still a bit out of it.

“It’s a bitch, isn’t it?” Jack mumbles.

Mac nods. “Sure is, Jack.”

“‘S why I hate it when you do it.”

Mac blinks and replays the comment in his head again. _It’s why I hate when you do it._

It occurs to Mac that he’s hidden a fair few injuries from Jack, only for them to later be discovered under less than ideal circumstances. If Mac is being honest, some of those circumstances and injuries are not so dissimilar to what’s happened here. Knowing that he’s been the source of distress for Jack, distress similar to what he’s just experienced, makes Mac regret his past actions.

Still, the hilarity that Jack chooses this moment to complain about Mac makes him smile. “I’ll try to do better.”

Jack makes a motion with his head that might be a nod and pats Mac’s hand with an uncoordinated flapping movement. Mac knows that Jack’s heard him, even if he’s too out of it to talk. He can, and will, apologize again, later, when Jack’s lucid enough to process it. 

It’s a lesson that Mac never wanted to learn, and Jack should never have had the opportunity to teach. He plans to put the knowledge to good use.


End file.
